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Abstract

The feasibility of identifying cancer cells by measuring the refractive index (RI) distribution across a single live cell with ultrahigh resolution full-field optical coherence microscopy (FF-OCM) is presented. The FF-OCM is utilized to quantify integral RI distributions of unmodified cells without any cell treatments and used as a biophysical indicator for diagnosing cell malignancy. Firstly, the physical thickness distribution of the cell adherent to a culture dish is measured by taking a series of 0.6 µm resolved en-face tomograms. Subsequently, from the en-face image of the bottom surface of the cell or the top surface of the dish, the phase gain image of the cell is extracted. Then, from these two measurements the axially averaged RI map of the cell is extracted. The implemented FF-OCM system had a 0.8 µm axial resolution and the phase measurement sensitivity of the system was around 124 mrad. With the system, RI maps of several living cell lines of normal and cancer cells were constructed and quantitatively analyzed. The experiments showed that cancer cells had higher RI than normal ones. This approach using the FF-OCM has significant potential for cancer diagnosis and dynamic cell analysis as in situ label-free biophysical assay.

(a) The phase image of the target pattern (group 6) measured with FF-OCM, (b) the surface profile of the same sample, (c) (black and solid) the line image of the surface profile (taken along the red dotted line in (b)) and (red and dotted) the image taken by AFM, (d) the time-elapsed phase (closed circles) and height (open circles) measurements were made at a point.